After Aamir Khan decided to opt out of the Rakesh Sharma biopic, it seems Shah Rukh Khan has finally given his nod to the upcoming movie, titled Salute. The makers, Ronnie Screwvala and Siddharth Roy Kapur had approached King Khan for the project. The Badshah of Bollywood who is currently occupied with his upcoming film Zero, will move on to the next project by September, claims reports.

“Zero is a film which will require a lot of VFX. Shah Rukh will wrap up Zero by April. He will perhaps begin the shoot of Salute by September and will shoot for close to two to three months and wrap its first schedule. The next schedule of Salute will begin from Jan 2019,” a source told Deccan Chronicle.

To be helmed by ad-filmmaker turned director Mahesh Mathai, the film will be based on the life of Rakesh Sharma, the first Indian astronaut to go to space. Sharma joined the Indian Air Force in the year 1970, flew on board the Soyuz T-11 with two Soviet cosmonauts in 1984 and landed on space station Salyut 7. When the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi asked him how India looked from outer space, he had said, “Saare Jahan Se Acha.”

At a recent event, SRK had said, “I haven’t signed a film yet. I really want to live with Zero because it’s a little tedious... I have been meeting Siddharth and Ronnie. I have met a lot of other directors and producers because I have to. But I haven’t confirmed anything yet…”

Another source close to the project revealed to DNA saying, “SRK wants to start shooting in September and continue for two months before he starts promoting Zero, which releases on Christmas. After that, he will resume Salute’s shoot from January 2019. The film is expected to release next year.”

Interestingly, this will be SRK’s first biopic although he has played real-life characters before such as in the movie Chak De India. It will be exciting to see SRK debuting another genre of acting in the same year where his upcoming movie portrays him as a dwarf.